Date:  Thu, 13 Apr 1995 10:21:11 -0400

From:  Wayne Glowka <wglowka[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]MAIL.GAC.PEACHNET.EDU>

Subject: Re: Peggy



>Leo Horishny wonders about my derivation (supported by other posters, I think)

>of

>>>Margaret--[trunc.]-->Meg-->Peg--[dimin.]-->Peggy

>

>>>As in

>

>>>Mary-->Molly-->Polly

>

>------------------------------

>He writes:

>>Ok, I can buy that, but having only a very rudimentary background in

>>linguistics, all you have

>>explained to me is the HOW of my question. I'm being picky, but I'm

>>interested too in the WHY!

>>What is the cause of the P stop having been chosen for this evolution versus a

>>D or a B? I'm

>>looking for the story behind how this change happened. I know it's there

>>somewhere, and that's what

>>I'm interested in finding out. ;-) Whence did this change occur?  What

>>ethnic pool did this happen

>>in? Was there a specific person that prompted this change indirectly? I

>>guess I'm looking for the

>>SOCIO-linguistic response to my query! <G>

>

>I can't speak to the sociolinguistics, but the phonetics seems straightforward

>enough: the marked bilabial nasal [m] shifts to the unmarked bilabial oral

>stop [p] (rather than shifting position as well as manner to yield [d] or [b]).

>Richard --> Dick would fit the same pattern, but Robert --> Bob doesn't (why

>THAT hypocoristic rather than, say, Dob?)

>

>P.S.--

>  After all, I'm Larry, but my kids always found it easier to say 'Daddy'

>         :)



My little girl (age 19 months) does something akin to the change of

"Robert" to "Bob." "Doggy" for her is "goggy," although she does say the

/d/ in "dada" ("daddy"), I'm proud to report. Her multisyllabic words have

the same consonant and vowel repeated. "Crackers" becomes "gagas."





Wayne Glowka

Professor of English

Director of Research and Graduate Student Services

Georgia College

Milledgeville, GA 31061

912-453-4222

wglowka[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]mail.gac.peachnet.edu